Theater Resources in the Humanities Department

The Humanities Department has a large and varied collection of books on the theater, including plays, theater history, acting instruction, and stage management.

• Pamphlet Play Collection 
• Book Collection 
• Musicals 
• Theater History/Acting/Production 
• Directory of Local Theaters 
• What's Playing? 
• The Baltimore Playwrights Festival 

Pamphlet Play Collection

• The Pamphlet Plays are acting editions of play scripts (about 4000 titles)
• Collection consists of primarily 19th and 20th century British and American plays
  • Does not include:
    • Musicals (housed in the Fine Arts & Music Department)
    • Shakespeare editions (shelved under the PR classification)
  • Notable authors include:
    • August Wilson
    • George Bernard Shaw
    • David Mamet
    • Harold Pinter
    • Arthur Miller
    • Sam Shepard
  • Sub-categories include the following:
    • Monologues
    • Religious plays
    • Christmas and other holiday plays
• Pamphlet Plays are listed in the regular catalog with the designation "Pam Play."

The Humanities Department has a card file index to help find particular kinds of plays, either by number of characters in a play, type of play (comedy, melodrama), or subject.

Book Collection

• General play anthologies (PN6120)
• Anthologies of plays from various countries and eras
• Plays by individual authors dating from all eras, from the
  • Ancient Greek (PA3626), to the
  • Medieval "mystery" plays (PR1260), to
  • Contemporary American playwrights (PS634)
• Countries represented include:
  • Japan (PL888)
  • France (PQ1223)
  • Italy (PQ4244)
  • Spain (PQ6267)
  • India (PK4474)
• American plays (PS628) include anthologies of plays by
  • African Americans
  • Jewish authors
  • Women 

Every inhabited continent is represented.  We own close to a thousand Shakespeare titles in various editions, including foreign language translations.

Musicals

The Fine Arts & Music Department owns more than 150 titles in their collection of musical plays (ML50). This department also owns books on musical theater history (ML1711) and production (MT955), as well as indexes to songs from musicals (ML128). In addition, Fine Arts has a large collection of scores and song collections (M1503 - 1508).

Theater History/Acting/Production

Besides plays, Humanities has materials on the history of theater for various countries and in different languages. The greatest number of books are those on American and British theater and include biographies of actors and famous playhouses. 

The collection of over 200 titles on acting includes such classics as:

• Stanislavsky's An Actor's Handbook (PN2061.S7)
• Uta Hagen's Respect for Acting (PN2061.H28 1973B)
• Michael Chekhov's To the Actor (PN2061.C54 2002)  

Humanities also owns books treating the following:

• Monologues and audition pieces (PN2080)
• Improvisation and mime (PN2071)
• Stand-up comedy (PN1969)

Acting is not the only way to participate in theater.  The collection also includes books on:

• Playwriting (PN1661) by such authors as
  • Alan Ayckbourn
  • Michael Chekhov
• Directing and producing (PN2053)
• Lighting and set design (PN2091)
• Stage make-up (PN2068)

Vocational guidance for actors is available in the Pratt Library's Job and Career Information Center.

Directory of Local Theaters

Audrey Herman Spotlighters Theatre 817 St. Paul Street, Baltimore, MD 21202  (410) 752-1225 Baltimore Shakespeare Festival 3900 Roland Avenue, Baltimore, MD 21211 (410) 366-8596 Center Stage  700 North Calvert Street, Baltimore, MD 21202 (410) 332-0033 Everyman Theatre 1727 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21201 (410) 752-2208 Fell's Point Corner Theatre 251 South Ann Street, Baltimore, MD 21231 (410) 276-7837  France-Merrick Performing Arts Center: Hippodrome Theatre 12 N. Eutaw Street, Baltimore, MD 21201 (410) 837-7400

Mobtown Players 3600 Clipper Mill Road, Suite 114, Baltimore, MD 21211 (410) 467-3057 Strand Theater Company 1823 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21201 (443) 874-4917 Theatre Hopkins The Johns Hopkins University  3400 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21218 (410) 516-7159 Theatre Project 45 West Preston Street, Baltimore, MD 21201 (410) 752-8558 Vagabond Players 806 South Broadway, Baltimore, MD 21231   (410) 563-9135

What's Playing?

The Baltimore Theatre Alliance has compiled a handy guide to what's playing at BTA member organizations, including contact information and each production's opening/closing dates. This site also has helpful information on local auditions, workshops, and job listings--essential for actors and theater lovers alike.

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival

The Baltimore Playwrights Festival is dedicated to nurturing the talents of Maryland and DC playwrights through public readings, discussions, critiques and workshopping of new plays. Their summer season is devoted to the presentation of these newly developed works for the entertainment and cultural edification of local audiences.